Sunday, December 8, 2013

Jones: from the Olympic media bench to the ice

Four years ago in Vancouver, Jennifer Jones sat beside me on
the media bench covering the Olympic curling for Yahoo! It was a fun week,
getting to know her better and enjoying the Vancouver Olympic experience. But
one thing was very clear: Jones didn’t want to be on the bench; she wanted to
be curling. You could tell it was eating her up to be watching, rather than
calling shots.

Now finally, she’ll get that chance in Sochi, Russia.

Jones, to me, is the ultimate competitor. She loves to curl
and loves to win. That’s what drove her to change her team, dropping Cathy Overton-Clapham in favour of Kaitlyn Lawes, a
move that saw her become Public Enemy No. 1 for many curling fans. I can still
remember the boos she received at the Scotties in Charlottetown as she faced
off against her former third.

We’ll never know if Jones would have won the Trials with
Overton-Clapham, but she felt she had a better chance with Lawes. She made a
tough move with one goal in mind and it worked out for her.

Of course after a tough week, the lawyer who now lives in
Horseshoe Valley, Ont., will have an even tougher one at the Olympics.

The lead up will be smothering and the competition in the
women’s field will be exceptionally tough. As good as Jones is, it would be
hard to consider her and the squad the outright favourites. Her international
record isn’t stellar and every game will be do or die.

Somehow, I think she’ll be up for the task in Russia.

In the papers, Paul Wiecek noted that, remarkably, the Jones
rink is the first one from curling-mad Manitoba (you know, the province with
curling licence plates) to make it to the Olympics in curling.

Meanwhile Cam Cole points out in Post Media that the country
is about to get a lot more Jennifer Jones and deservedly so, after a game in
which there wasn’t much fanfare – just a lot of good shotmaking.